shelling for beginners

On Saturday morning, this idealistic blogger drove to Grand Rapids’s Fulton Street Farmer’s Market in search of peas. It’s June, doggone it, and I predicted the market would be pea pandemonium, a treasure trove of not just snow and sugar snap, but the shellable English pea, as well (which, you’ll soon find out, is just the variety my recipes required). To my dismay, the market stands offered only snow and sugar snap that day. Knowing full well that these pea breeds are intended to be eaten whole unlike their English cousin, I purchased two quarts of sugar snaps and hurried away to begin shelling. Once home, I attacked the project with vigor.

Forty-five painstaking minutes later, the two quarts had been reduced to a measly three-quarter cup of lime green pellets–not nearly enough for the recipes I had in store.

Initially, I felt deceived. How dare those stingy pods yield so little gain after so much effort? Eventually, however, irritation subsided into humble acceptance that I had simply chosen the wrong pea varietal. After all, this blog chronicles the experience–or inexperience–of a self-titled sprout for a reason.

Even though I had learned an important lesson in humility, the fact remained that a three-quarter cup of green peas–no matter how fresh and local–was a grossly insufficient amount to proceed with. Swallowing my now pea-sized pride, I drove to Meijer for a bag of the frozen stuff before continuing to cook.